Malakai

by Michele Hauf

  Rissa almost let out a chirp for mercy, but instead she stepped back and placed her hand on the fruit cart for support. Promptly sinking her fingernails into an orange, she squeezed it hard enough to crack its ripe skin and send forth a thick orange spurt.

  So much for steadying her emotions.

  "So leave," she forced herself to say.

  She followed his eyes down to her chest where her nipples poked up. Should have worn a sweater. The man licked his lips.

  "I knew you were wolf when I first saw you at the festival," she said, attempting to redirect his thoughts.

  He nodded and stepped closer. "Then we have all the important stuff out there. Just wish I would have known about you sooner."

  Would that have kept him from taking her home with him?

  She squeezed the orange harder. He noticed her uncomfortable reaction and took the mulched fruit from her and set it aside. The juice trailed over his palm and he swiped a citrus-oiled finger over her mouth.

  Rissa choked on the sweetness. "Oh, Kai, we can't do this."

  "No, we can't."

  The hard column of his thigh melded against hers. With the cart right behind her, she couldn't move away from him. Yet Rissa was drawn to his aggressive command. To the power that emanated from his muscles and teased her to touch once more. Never had she been so compelled by a man. And all she could think was how he'd mastered her body and treated her like a queen by worshipping her over and over in the moonlight.

  "Sugar," he said, his eyes falling on her juice-stained lips.

  Shoved against the oranges, Rissa's body bent backward over the sweet fruit as Kai leaned over her, and gripped her hair none-to-gently. "I want you, despite the fact that you're a—" He glanced around cautiously. "I don't do faeries."

  "So you've said."

  She couldn't find admonishing words because he'd spoken what felt to her like truth. The man had something against her breed, and yet, was compelled to her despite that prejudice.

  If she cared the tiniest bit for him, she should struggle free and run from him. Instead the heat of him, the exquisite scent of wild, horny man called to her senses and teased her need to remain staunch into a soft melty puddle of girlie desire.

  "I want you again," he said in that deep, growly, between-the-sheets tone that melted her even more. Cleanup in the produce aisle, anyone? "One more time."

  He glanced aside. An elderly gentleman picking over the apples held one aloft as he observed their clutch.

  "Much as it kills me not to kiss you until you moan and beg me to move my mouth lower, I'll save the public display of affection."

  "F-for later?"

  "For fifteen minutes from now. That's how long it'll take me to drive you to my home and put you up against the wall in the kitchen."

  Rissa's legs weakened and all parts of her that she'd gathered up from the girlie puddle again grew hot and moist. Wanting. Hungry.

  Screw her better intentions. If he wanted to get busy again, she wasn't about to protest. Let her vampiric curse fall where it may.

  She'd never claimed to be a good girl.

  ***

  True to his word, Kai lifted her and shoved her against the kitchen wall. The sun was setting but the few golden strands that beamed through the surrounding forest landed his shoulder-length hair in glints of hematite blue. He kissed her neck and down her breasts, tugging away her shirt as if a nuisance. Hungry—like a wolf?—he devoured her skin.

  Yes, please, she thought. Make this another night to remember. She had never before experienced such intimacy with a man. Seriously. Sex had been sex, because—it had become her necessity.

  Rissa opened her eyes and met Kai’s delving gaze.

  “Yes,” she murmured, “kiss me, wolf.”

  And the sparkle moved from her stomach to her mouth as his kiss struck her as if a fallen star, a blissful explosion of wondrous sensation. Strong hands moved along her arms, caressing, not forceful but exploring lightly, seeking her truths.

  Ah, but her truths were buried so deeply he would not excavate them this night. She would make sure of it.

  “I can hear the festival drums again,” she said, and pressed a palm over his heart. “Music entrances me.”

  “Me too. Especially the drum jam. It's transcendent. Makes me go to another place.” Another kiss ventured from her mouth and along her jaw, to nuzzle and taste her neck. "I like this place better, though. Right here."

  Rissa tilted her head, and stretching her neck made the flesh there more sensitive to Kai’s tongue, his pressing kisses. When he slid to her clavicle she surprised herself with a long and languorous moan. The man was unraveling her. Breaking open her preconceived expectations that sex should be a chore with one melting kiss after another.

  "I want to dive under all this pink and get to the real pink of you."

  Mercy. "Yes, please."

  His mouth closed over her nipple and sucked gently, then more firmly. Each lash of his tongue drew up a quiver, a desperate wanting, the need to chase stars to their bursting point.

  Subdued, as compared to their previous frenzied pairing, he lingered at her breast, giving it the utmost attention. This connection spiraled out to her extremities and lifted her. Well, not literally. She'd need her wings out for that, and she wasn't about to unfurl them. Unless he wished it. Would he?

  No, not if he didn't like faeries.

  The man didn't even like her and yet, here she was a willing player in this seductive game. Oh, why had she chosen this one?

  Kai could not resist her powerful pull. Her muse must have already gotten under his skin. She wondered briefly if he were a creative sort, and when she was about to ask, he tugged the shirt over her head and tossed it aside. He did the same with his shirt, and as Rissa's eyes fell upon his physique she forgot what she'd been about to ask.

  His hard muscles flexed as she glided her fingertips over the hard-as-iron (but never so deadly) chest. If he were iron, he could kill her.

  Such a sweet death, that.

  He studied her gaze with a sensuous tilt to his lips. "You make it difficult, Rissa.”

  “Difficult?”

  “Yes. To avoid…things.”

  "Things?"

  "Something I'd rather not discuss right now."

  "It's about faeries, and you not liking them." "If I didn't like you, you wouldn't be here right now." "So you hate me but you like me?"

  "I never said hate, I just… Hell, let's stop talking and do this."

  And he kissed her deeply, dipping his tongue into her mouth as if to claim a prized and ancient elixir. Wrapping her legs around behind his hips, she was crushed against the wall. Trapped. And happy for it.

  Whatever it was he found difficult to talk about, she didn’t want to explore. Because it seemed so easy right now. And easy didn’t come often.

  Already she could feel her energy increasing. Sex with Kai would make her stronger.

  Rissa pushed him away and held out her hand, stopping him from his return approach. "On your knees, big boy. You want it? Crawl to me."

  He stood there, taking in her bared breasts, waning daylight falling soft and blue upon his gorgeous physic. With a flick of his fingers, he unbuttoned his jeans and shrugged them down and off. He wore boxer briefs, and they hugged his erection jealously. With a bend of knee, he landed on his knees and hands. And the beast began to stalk toward her, slowly, head raised and eyes on hers. A snarl lifted his mouth on one side.

  Rissa shivered. The look in Kai's eyes devoured her. And that arch of his dark brow? Mercy. If she hadn't known he was wolf, she would have labeled him panther for his stealth approach and dangerous prowess.

  Deciding she didn't want to do this on the cold kitchen floor, she dashed around him and scampered up the steel stairs to the bedroom. When she turned to look down, Kai sat back on his haunches and spread out his arms. A man willing to serve her desires.

  "Come to me," she said in a sure tone.

  "As you command, sugar c
ube," he growled, giving the words an extra dose of sexual syrup.

  The silken predator crawled toward the stairs and took them like the panther she'd imagined him. Stealth and silent, yet focused on getting to what he wanted.

  In one smooth move, he rose to sweep her into his dangerous clutches. She clung, wanting her lover to do things to her she could only dream about because the good kind of pleasure dreams had been few and far between lately.

  She wouldn't allow one moment to think how wrong this connection really was.

  Lacing her arms about his neck she kissed him soundly as he stopped before the bed, rumpled and unmade, the white sheets begging for them to nestle in for a long and vigorous coupling.

  Laying her down, he buried his face in her hair and found her earlobe, kissing it, tugging it with his teeth. Rissa slid her hands over his hips, and tucked them under the boxer waistband and slid them over his hard, sculpted derriere.

  His cock jutted up for attention, and she squeezed it. Kai hissed into her mouth. A 'do it hard and fast and as long as you like' hiss.

  She slid her hand up and down his length. It was so thick her curled fingers did not touch. The head of him was already wet with pre-come and she slicked through it to make the glide easy and faster.

  The world slipped away and she held a treasure in her hands. A beastly monster of sex and sinew was Malakai Saint-Pierre. She couldn't have walked away from him in the grocery store for all the crystal in Faery.

  Her fingers moving rapidly, she sensed his crescendo building to a tense, shuddering race for release. But he wanted more. He needed more. And she would not disappoint.

  "Inside you. Now," he growled. "Want to come inside."

  Without waiting for her to agree, he pushed aside her leg and teased her open with a finger, followed by the hot, thick head of him. He eased in slowly, growling, and she could feel the tense and release of his ab muscles with every inch he gave her.

  He nuzzled his mouth against her neck as he pumped inside her furiously, seeking the bliss. Suddenly the wolf jerked up his head and met her gaze. Kai cried out as he came, hard and powerfully, slamming his hips against hers and hilting himself again and again. He clasped her to his body, hugging her, burying his face within her hair.

  With a cry of triumph, he rolled off her and spread his arms wide as he landed on the pillows at the head of the bed. His legs tangled within hers, his stomach panted as he rode the climax.

  Rissa's turn would come, and she wanted it—needed his energy to restore hers. But more than anything she now grew desperate to find a way to break her curse. She couldn't conceive walking away from this man again. But the more they made love the weaker he would grow, until finally, he died.

  She turned onto her side and glided her hand along his thigh, which tensed under her touch. Her wolf chuckled softly and tangled his fingers in her hair.

  There was only one way to change the future she wanted to make with this man. And that required she kill the Unseelie king Malrick. The man who had cursed her a vampiric sidhe.

  Chapter Three

  Again, he woke alone in bed. Sneaky little faery.

  But for the best, Kai thought as he rose and showered, and put on his jeans and a fitted tee-shirt and headed out to the shed.

  He'd not expected to run into her yesterday in the grocery store, and once he'd laid eyes on her lips and those nipples, resistance, as they say, had been futile. Right there in the store he'd wanted to slide his hand up her thigh and bury his fingers in her sweet, wet warmth and bring her to orgasm.

  He was not going to be stupid about this. Already, he'd stepped too far into the curse. To avoid the curse he simply had to avoid faeries. As well, there was the falling in love detail. Not that Kai thought he could ever fall in love with a woman after having sex with her twice. Hell no. There was a big difference between a woman a man took home to fuck and a woman he could love.

  But there was something about Rissa that felt as though she'd burrowed under his skin and every time he brushed a hand over it he thought to smell her sugar scent and feel her lips upon him. All of which made it difficult to get her out of his head. But as well, he almost thought to hear her whisper. An unintelligible whisper—but he understood, and it led him outside.

  Damn, if he wasn't raring to go this morning. The shed door squealed open and he wandered into the cool shadows across the dirt floor. Sunlight beamed through a few holes he'd drilled in the tin walls when building the thing. The smell of charred tinder and metal pleased him.

  It had been weeks since he'd picked up the hammer and pounded metal into form. The last sword he'd made he'd given to his father, Creed. His father had once slain werewolves in medieval times. That was so wrong when Kai thought too much about it, so he tried not to think about how many wolves his dad had killed.

  But since gifting his father the sword, Kai had been in an inspirational funk. Feeling sort of at odds and cringing inside his own skin at the thought of designing something new.

  Until now. This morning he felt alive and eager, ready to take up the hammer and forge something amazing. The muse had returned, and she was whispering in his ear with Rissa's candied voice.

  His father had encouraged Kai as a teenager to take up the swordsmith's hammer after his parents had realized Kai was allergic to iron. Creed had been insistent what didn't kill a man, if mastered, could make him stronger. Kai's sister, Kambriel, had the same allergy. It had to do with the fact they had been conceived courtesy of faery glamour. Iron killed the sidhe dead.

  But not wolves, or vampires, for that matter. Which was fortunate for Kambriel, since she was full-blood vampire.

  Kai was an anomaly in a mortal world and he was fine with that. Malakai Saint-Pierre walked this earth confident and proud of his ancestry (yes, even the battlesword-swinging antics from his father's previous centuries). He wanted to own his place in this world. And he did.

  But not completely. He'd yet to start a family, and that was the one thing he suspected could most fulfill his quest for belonging.

  Yet he wasn't barking up the right tree by sleeping with a faery.

  Strolling into the shop, he donned work leathers, and fired up the forge. Today, he would begin something special.

  ***

  Two days passed quickly, and Kai barely noticed the moon rising or the sun setting. He spent most of the time in his shop, only pausing to eat when his stomach growled. On the second night he took a midnight swim to clean off the soot grime and refresh his thoughts, then returned to the forge.

  The sword was nearly finished, and everything about its creation felt instinctual. When normally he planned out a design in advance on paper, then made changes as he forged the weapon, this time he simply followed the hammer and the metal. And his muse's whispers.

  And with that instinctual method to craft also came a knowing. This was a weapon a faery warrior would covet, yet why it should be so, he couldn't fathom. He only knew this blade was not to be wielded by a mere mortal or any of the paranormal breeds, save the sidhe. But if Rissa was his muse, as he liked to think, then it made sense.

  Kai stood away from the forge and swiped his sweating brow with an equally sweaty wrist. He'd stripped off his shirt and his suede overalls hung about his hips. His feet, in the heavy leather boots with steel toes, were itchy.

  "Time for a break," he muttered.

  Though it was difficult to set the sword aside. The steel flashed with the fire's reflection, and then it emitted a canorous note as if voicing a desire for him to remain. The metal had changed over the days. Into something remarkable, an indiscernible metal he'd never known or seen before.

  Something magical.

  Indeed, faery.

  "Maybe a little longer," he decided, taking up the sword again. Inspiration was so ineffable he wanted to go with it while it hung around.

  It wasn't until well after sunset on the third day that Kai's grumbling stomach forced him to cool the forge and clean his tools for the night. Beside
s, he'd hit a block: the whispers had stopped. He set the hammer aside and tugged off his shirt. Shrugging down his suede work overalls to bare his chest, he strode out of the shop to take in the not-so-cool August breeze that wafted off the stream.

  Rissa's image filled his thoughts. Need you. Miss you. Why hadn't he thought to get her phone number?

  Beneath the shade of an oak tree, and before the stream, stood a cool, tall vampire who wore his dark hair down the middle of his back.

  "Dad!" Kai walked up and hugged Creed Saint-Pierre. "What are you up to tonight?"

  The nearly millennia-old vampire had a soft, sure smile that creased at the corners of his eyes. "I was in the area and thought I'd stop by. Haven't seen you at the house for weeks. Figured you'd be secluded in your shop. Working on something?"

  "I've had a renewed streak of inspiration. Let me show you."

  They wandered into the shed, lit with bare bulbs hanging from hooks at the ceiling on long extension cords. Kai showed his father the blade.

  He and his dad were close, much closer than he and his mom. Which he'd always thought weird because his mom was wolf, and she'd shown him the ropes at puberty. How to get control of his werewolf had been a challenge. They'd gone for runs in the forest and spent entire nights loping about. But ever since his sister, Kambriel had left to 'explore her life' in Paris, his mother, Blu, had been cold toward him.

  "It's—do you hear something?" Creed asked as he moved the blade before him.

  "It's the blade, singing," Kai said, as if a singing blade were common and something he heard every day.

  "Interesting." Creed handed him the blade reverently, placing it across his forearm as any warrior would do. As he had surely done many times before, since his father had been born in the 1100's and had served many kings with blade in hand. "I know you didn't get your creativity from me."

  "You did teach me the art of sword fight."

  "A dying skill, but still valued by the paranormal breeds. Your allergies any better?"

  "I still get itchy around iron, but the more I work on this blade, the less so. It's as if the metal is taking on a new form, unlike iron."